


dance me in

by thenewhope



Category: NCIS
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-01-08
Updated: 2006-01-08
Packaged: 2017-10-05 01:25:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,263
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/36239
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thenewhope/pseuds/thenewhope
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She has never been that person, never had the ability to fit her body between beats and breaths, to move with the rhythm of another person's heart.</p>
            </blockquote>





	dance me in

**Author's Note:**

> for faeriegrrrl23 as part of ncis_tinsel in 2006. title from Sons &amp; Daughters.

*  
Ziva pushes between Gibbs and McGee and just barely stops on the other side of the door. The hallway smells of sun baked sand. There's too much electricity in the air and the hair on her arms rises with static.

Ziva worries for one blinding second that she's going to choke on it all. Then she is breathing again, in and out and farther and father from the room behind her.

She takes a long sip of Gibbs' too hot coffee, and focuses on the burn as it pushes down her throat. The coffee is soft with heavy cream and bitter from too little sugar. It's exactly how Ziva likes it. And exactly the opposite of what Gibbs drinks.

McGee is talking, reciting a citizen's rights, but the sting of metal cuffs on skin is louder than his words. Ziva can taste rust on her tongue. She takes another sip of coffee.

Gibbs doesn't look at her, just leads Laura Osgood out the door and down the hallway toward the exit. She's grateful for that.

McGee stops next to her. He smiles at her, quiet and a bit confused. She's grown fond of that smile over these last few weeks, and she's glad to see it right now.

She pushes off the wall and he falls into step next to her as they follow Gibbs out the building. He doesn't say a thing about the way her coffee is shaking in her hand. She's grateful for that, too.

*  
Ziva watches Gibbs say goodbye to Zach from a quiet spot next to the stairs. She can here McGee and Tony, talking with Abby a few feet to her left.

"I'm going to a party at Club Seven." Abby turns in place for them, showing off her outfit in shades of black and red. "You guys want to come with?"

They both beg off, claiming exhaustion. Abby nods and smiles and calls them wimps.

"How 'bout you?" She asks Ziva, eyebrow arched in question and arms crossed against her chest. She's smiling.

It's a test, a joke, a challenge.

Ziva doesn't care which. She takes her up on them all.

She's not sure whose surprise she gets more satisfaction from, Tony's or Abby's.

*  
Abby is watching her, quiet and bouncy, as they make their way into the club. She's waiting for a reaction to the lights, the music, the people.

Places like this are the same everywhere in the world. There is more metal in this one than any Ziva has been in before, but everything else is the same.

There is the same electricity in the air, the same intent shadowed in disco balls and alcohol.

It makes her stomach turn like all the others.

She doesn't tell Abby any of this, just lifts an eyebrow and smiles, noncommittal.

Abby grins back. "What's your poison?" She nods her head toward the bar.

Four vodkas, neat, later Ziva is starting to feel the place. There is heat, everywhere, and noise. She can feel it pushing into her blood with every breath.

She considers taking Abby's offer to dance. She feels like moving, like burning off some of her exhaustion. But she has never been that person, never had the ability to fit her body between beats and breaths, to move with the rhythm of another person's heart.

There is another dance, though, that she has always been good at. And she doubts very much that Abby will turn her down.

*  
The bathroom stall is just like the rest of the bar: normal. Ziva's mind catalogs every inch of it.

Inside, Abby turns to face Ziva and giggles. She says, "I've always wanted to do this." and makes the first move.

Ziva hides her surprise in the curl of her fingers in the fabric of Abby's shirt. She growls and pushes and bites just a little bit. Abby giggles again and lets herself be pressed against the wall.

Their movements and breaths are a blur, their rhythm much faster than that of the song blaring around them.

Ziva sucks in a hiss at the cold bite of a ring against her stomach. Abby's hand is quick against her skin, her fingers sure inside her.

Her other hand is cupped against her cheek. Ziva bends a little, searching, and finds a finger. She nips at it and holds as she comes, shuddering and fierce against Abby's body.

Ziva's head knocks against the hollow wall and stays there. She follows the pulse at Abby's neck, counting to one hundred before she pulls back and kisses a thank you against Abby's mouth.

Abby smiles and pushes away from the wall. "Are you ready to dance yet?"

She isn't yet, not nearly. But she can fake it.

Ziva smiles and nods and lets her hand fall to Abby's hip for good measure as they leave the stall.

She breathes in the noise of the club and starts counting in her head. She already has her exit planned.

*  
The next morning Ziva takes the elevator down to the subbasement. Chip stands next to her, calls her "ma'am" and does his best not to fidget. She's used to making American men nervous, and doesn't spare him more than a smile and nod.

Chip motions for her to exit the elevator first, and she heads straight for the back room, where Abby is dancing as she works over one of the lab machines. The doors slide open and Ziva recognizes the song from the night before. Its beat matches the one that has been rolling against the back of her head all morning.

Abby turns to her with a smile and doesn't stop moving with the music. Before she can yell a greeting over the music her eyes fall to the cup in Ziva's hand.

"For you." Ziva steps closer and offers the cup. It's silly, but she's nervous now. Abby is still looking at the cup, studying it like she's trying to understand what it means.

Ziva is not sure what she means by it, either. A gift, maybe. Or a thank you. A peace offering (except Ziva doesn't believe in peace).

She hadn't planned on getting Abby anything, but she'd been caught in traffic across from a convenience store long enough for it to seem like a good idea.

When she entered the store there was a sign taped haphazardly across the front of the soda fountain and a sticky, bright green puddle on the floor in front of it. She almost turned around and continued to work empty handed. But the frozen-soda machine was sign and puddle free.

Ziva doesn't know if Abby even likes these things, but the clerk said it was "all the rage," and it seemed like something Abby would enjoy. The clerk pointed out that there was no caffeine in it and Ziva bought it without a second thought.

Now, though, she isn't so sure. Abby is still looking at her with that strange little half-smile, and the plastic cup is burning cold against her palm.

She seems to make up her mind, and grabs the cup from Ziva in one swift motion she almost doesn't see coming.

"Thanks!" She takes a long sip through the brightly colored straw and skips back to her desk. There's a Caff Pow there, a sign that one of the boys has already been by this morning.

Abby pushes the old cup to the side with her new one and gets back to work. Ziva feels bad that she didn't think of anything more original.

Abby doesn't seem to mind.

*


End file.
